Saturday, January 8, 2011

The eagerly awaited new book from the Emmy-winning, Oscar-hosting, Daily Show-anchoring Jon Stewart—the man behind the megaseller America (The Book).

Where do we come from? Who created us? Why are we here? These questions have puzzled us since the dawn of time, but when it became apparent to Jon Stewart and the writers of The Daily Show that the world was about to end, they embarked on a massive mission to write a book that summed up the human race: What we looked like; what we accomplished; our achievements in society, government, religion, science and culture — all in a tome of approximately 256 pages with lots of color photos, graphs and charts.

After two weeks of hard work, they had their book. EARTH (The Book) is the definitive guide to our species. With their trademark wit, irreverence, and intelligence, Stewart and his team will posthumously answer all of life's most hard-hitting questions, completely unburdened by objectivity, journalistic integrity, or even accuracy.

Received from the publisher for review.

This one gets two stars. While I love Jon Stewart, this was just not the best format for the material. It would be infinitely better in print. That said, this audio version was tolerable for only half of the first disc. It tried to have a Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy feel and failed miserably. It was just too ... something. The readers were good, but it didn't do justice to the material. It felt rather as if they were trying too hard and left you wincing instead of laughing. If you're up for this definitely get it in print!